Hearts on Fire
by Duvestal
Summary: Jan Jansen and Co takes on YagaShura, while Garrick's heart gets crashed into progressively smaller pieces. Which amuses Coran. And so on....
1. Chapter 1

1.

"My brave Sir Garrick!"

Garrick lifted his eyes, sad like that of a spaniel inclined to Netheril philosophy and obesity; golden-brown like smoky topazes from Gallena Mountains. He was noticeably drunk, and even more noticeably unhappy. Even his wooden harp looked sulky, its frame unpolished and its silver strings sagging.

"So," asked the newcomer cheerfully, "how was the bridesmaid? Apart from being pinker, whiter and crunchier than a spring radish?"

"You er… you spend too much time with Jan Jansen, Coran. The world is not a vegetable row," Garrick replied.

"Hmm, I grant you that. Some of it is an orchard. I so love peaches and other sweet fruit… oh! and beehives full of honey…" Coran sighed dreamily and licked his lips.

"Leave me, gardener. Every moment without Lady Irlana is like er… knife in my heart. I am in… uhm… in…"

"In melancholy," Coran supplied cheerfully. "Any man deprived of Lady Irlana's favors would feel the same. Why, I rued my decision to cuddle little Tiene, though at the time it seemed like a pleasant contrast to the primness, properness and two hundred pounds of plated armor."

Garrick gave him a murderous stare: "You… you are talking about a lady, Coran."

"Yes, I do. And, Sir, I have news to cheer a gravedigger' corpse… or you. We are to join your stolen dream, her honey-tongued gnome and Jan on a grand quest."

"How could you be so cruel?!" Garrick exclaimed. "Every moment with Lady Irlana is like er… knife in my heart."

"As is every moment without her. Come, Sir. Honor and glory await, and the spectacle of your Lady bending nigh in half to kiss her gnome. If that does not cure you, you will have to start drinking harder spirits. Mockery and rum glued together many a broken heart."

Garrick groaned in response and mumbled something.

"Yes, I know," Coran said benevolently, pulling the man up to his feet. "It's like a knife in your heart."

"Honeycomb," Cyrando was saying, "while we are waiting on Jan's recruits, I wish to recite a madrigal in your honor. I had come up with it while watching you in your sleep last night."

Cyrando was standing, Lady Irlana seated. She stretched her hand and tickled him under his chin.

"You might have woken me instead, Storm Giant."

Cyrando blushed: "My lady love, it would have been a selfish course. The great adventure we are about to embark upon will require us to be… rested."

A little frown spoiled the porcelain smoothness of Lady Irlana's features: "'Tis not an adventure, Storm Giant, but a task of great import, if Jan Jansen is to be believed."

"Your lady cut right to the point, Cyrando, she nailed that turnip so to speak. Why, the very accurateness of her remark reminds me of my twice-removed cousin and the dart-"

"If you ever again as much as breathe the word out about that darting contest, you are no blood of mine!" Cyrando said forcefully.

"Greetings to the brave company. Cyrando, I think he had lost at least two-third of his kin that way," Coran grinned, ushering pale Garrick into the common room of the Five Flaggons. "But those who remain are numerous and the sturdy sort, judging from what they had to live through. Why, that Uncle Sparky for one…"

"We are not here to talk about Uncle Sparky," Irlana said icily. "Jan Jansen, I remember very distinctively asking you to find the worthy allies to help us in a great cause."

"Rightfully so, dearest twice removed cousin through marriage. 'Twas a wonderful plan. That Order strategy and tactics training pays of every single time! Mayhap, I will tell you the full tale of how my choice fell upon Coran and Garrick here, after considering a goodly number of other adventurers, mercenaries and similar men-at-arms, but before that I will hear about your time exploring the attic in the Jansen's mansion. You looked better satisfied with the venture than I was when I cleared it out the last time. Why, the only useful thing I found was Aunt Goldenrod's wooden leg and something Lantanese that just asked to be added to the bruiser-mates' secret formulation. I am not sure yet what it does, but it smells potent. Or moldy, but we shall find it out shortly, never fear."

Cyrando gave the sack tied to Jan Jansen's belt a dubious look. Garrick had eyes only for Lady Irlana. Lady Irlana dropped hers and found Cyrando's hand.

Coran grinned: "Now, perhaps, someone could fill us in on the particularities of the quest Garrick and me had signed up to attend to. It irks me to be clueless."

"Oh, really?" Irlana inquired archly. "I would have never guessed."

"Dear cousins and friends!" Jan Jansen announced, waving away the steam that suddenly hazed the air. "I had received summons from Sir Orlando, also known as the Brave, and the Accursed, who in some parts is named The Hand of Justice, while in the others The Gnome with the Red Shield Taller-Than-Him, and yet elsewhere they call him the Best of the Bhaal. I have heard that in the East they call him the Westerner, and in the West the Easterner. I could not confirm if the called him the Northerner in the South, but it is beyond doubt that the man referred to as the Southerner in the North is also him, so we have doubt that he'd be Northerner as well.

In other words, I am speaking of the chap you all know as Lanny."

"So, you are speaking of er… Lanny of Candlekeep?" Garrick asked.

"Aye," Jansen replied. "His very own self. My five-time removed nephew. On his mother's side, of course. And he'd given me a great task."

All the eyes: Garrick's smoky, Coran's green, Irlana's blue and Cyrando's hazelnut trained on Jan with more than a shade of murderous fury while the dramatic pause stretched as if a mage had magically silenced Jan Jansen. However, it could not have been true, because as every Athkatalan dog knew, Jan had been newly and permanently immune to such a whicked spell.

This was the only reward (apart from his share of the booty) he asked of the said Lanny and the mighty Elven Queen Ellesime for his participation in the fateful rescue of maid Imoen from the fortress of Spellhold and some by-blow questing. It was said that after the last sounds of the magical incantation faded away, Lanny with great sorrow decided to part his ways with the famous Jan Jansen. Coincidentally, Lanny himself was asked to leave the safe sylvan heaven of Suldanessellar at about the same moment. Peculiar, how the things always happen in threes. They say, that there is even a Rule of Three that establishes that very axiom.

Jan the Never-Silent did not worry about such a rule, and finally deigned to speak:

"My dear nephew Lanny wants us to go to Saradush and assassinate the evil fire giant called Yaga-Shura, besieging that city. He'd do it himself, but he is too tied up with something of a family problem."

"Uhm…" Garrick asked, "where is that er… Saradush?"


	2. Chapter 2

2. 

Ripe with anticipation, two gnomes, two humans and a lonely elf crowded around the ale-stained table. A round table. Some say, that there is a glorious legend about an adventuring company and a round table, but Jan Jansen was too busy with creating the new myth to stop and reflect on it.

The others just stared as Jan the Never-Silent's stubby finger tapped at a small picture of a castle. The intricate script above his broken nail and the painted castle read Saradush.

"We will need to buy horses," Lady Irlana said scratching her chin, the gesture normally reserved for bearded folk: men and dwarves.

"Spending gold on horses is an unpractical habit when you are friends with a great mage who can conjure a conveniently located, fashionable portal," Jan announced. 

"The last time I dropped by the Jansen's mansion, I did not notice Elminster's velvet slippers by the threshold," Coran mused.

Jan smiled brightly: "Of course we can buy the horses from Grandma's Brambles stable. I've heard that the last time she was selling a stallion to a merchant from Sembia, she charged him ten golden pieces, and that was a bargain. When he brought the animal home, it turned out to be more of a mare, and not really a horse, teeth non-withstanding. The last I heard, they were wed. "

"I'll take the portal," Lady Irlana said mortified.

"It is easy for you to say, sweet pea. You already have a husband. But think of the inconsolable among us," Coran said pointedly, wrapping his arm around Garrick's shoulders. 

"But I am…" Lady Irlana sang sweetly, "The two of you look wonderfully together. Why let some mount come between?" 

Garrick twisted away from laughing Coran. "I uhm… I think that I would rather go through er… Jansen's portal than ride a Jansen's horse."

"Don't you dare!" Lady Irlana said, incinerating Coran with a glare, until the man swallowed his jape. "Jan, I don't know what malevolent imp you took for an advisor, but to burden me with the company of two wool-brained men who courted me before I wed! To the Jansen's mansion, and not another word, or I swear, I will send the lot of you against the giant armed with pebbles and needles."

"C-could you? Aren't you er… a paladin?" Garrick asked faintly. 

"Precisely," Lady Irlana snapped and stormed out of the doors, Cyrando, Coran and Garrick trailing in her wake.

Jansen touched one finger to the side of his bulbous nose smugly: "One who had dumped her, and another whom she dumped herself." Then Jan ran after the company, holding the folds of his multicolored robes up, his short legs pumping vigorously under him; He wore scarlet plush slippers.

Later that day, Lady Irlana sat very straight in the middle of a couch upholstered in what appeared to once have been a tapestry. Cyrando was lounging on one side of her, an arm around her waist. Garrick perched on the other side, blushing deeply every time Cyrando moved, and the too soft pillows made him slide toward Irlana. Coran was leaning against the wall, watching the trio with an amused grin on his full lips.

"Now, Garrick, what this stick is for?" the elf asked lazily, pointing at Garrick's slender blade. "Herding cattle? Or switching your noble-born students when they sing wrong tunes?"

Garrick fingered the hilt and then his conical new beard. "This, Coran, is called a rapier, and I'll… er… I'll have you know that I am awfully good with it."

"Oh," Coran said, "Oh. I will be curious to see it used against a fire giant. Why, you'll likely tickle that poor thing to death. A horrid fate."

Garrick bristled and turned away from Coran. To Lady Irlana. The paladin sighed. "Coran, I have heard that true masters can make a rapier into a deadly weapon. It's a new thing, of course, so I doubt that you will understand Garrick's yearning to try it."

Coran extended his hand. Reluctantly, Garrick got up from the couch, and unsheathed the blade. The pillows compensated, and Irlana rolled into Cyrando with a soft chuckle. The gnome did not mind.

Coran tried the point of the blade with his thumb and did a few feints and parries in the air.

"A good sword will cut it in two, Garrick, and you will break it on a plate with one missed stroke. You'd better be good in finding the slots to push it in."

"I am good at it!" Garrick exclaimed hotly.

"Oh…" Coran replied, "Oh…" And his eyes swung to Irlana. Garrick looked at the elf in reproach and started blushing all over again. 

He was saved from further taunts by Jan bursting through the doors, literally shining with sweat and success.

"Uncle Scratchy's toes be curled forever! Are you ready?"

"One question," Lady Irlana said, patting the cushion vacated by Garrick, "When are you going to return this precious circa 600 in Dale Reckoning tapestry to DeVille's family? They would appreciate the gesture. After all, it's their glorious ancestor, bathing King's boots in his blood on the battlefield."

"My dear cousin twice removed through marriage, I would gladly chat with you about the most renown family of DeVille's, the circumstances under which Aunt Malladie had acquired this couch, and why her lover, known only as Pit-bull insisted on the historical subject for the loveseat, but after, after we'd solved Lanny's little problem. The portal is waiting, coz. And the portals, they are just like kettles - let them unwatched and they'd not only splatter boiling water all over, but burn the unfortunate kitchen to crisps."

From Lady Irlana's face, she was not minding to see Jansen's shabby mansion to go up in flames, but Cyrando patted her on the arm. "Let us move, honey cake. The fire giants are currently amusing themselves with killing the good folk in Saradush."

It was Irlana's turn to blush crimson. She jumped up to her feet and glided past Jan Jansen the Never Silent, leaving Cyrando to scramble out of the pillow trap on his own.

So occupied, Cyrando was the last one to enter the study, which sported a shimmering arch amid the normal clutter. Garrick must have already gotten through, and Coran's boot was melting in the shine. Then his head popped back into view. 

"Sweet pea," the elf said to Irlana, "keep your proud head down. This is a gnome-sized portal, and a bruise on your lovely forehead will spoil this adventure."

"What a gall to call you a sweet pea!" Cyrando muttered to his wife.

Irlana smiled down at him: "He will tell a cow that she has luxurious breasts, my love. What he really thinks is that I am a small-brained fool in plate mail, but under it, I have what interests him. Hence, sweet pea."

"I will teach him a lesson," Cyrando vowed. 

"Don't bother," Lady Irlana said bending her head down before stepping through the portal, "He heeds no teachers, like every other fool."

Cyrando followed his wife, thinking for the first time the troubled thoughts of a man wed to a beauty. The strange _expression _of Jan Jansen's glistening nose added to Cyrando's misery as he walked through the light, and was on top of a hill overlooking the swarm of fireballs flying high in the sky; the smoking stones of the city walls; the red-and-gold tents pitched in the field below; the huge shapes running around the camp, hoarding the normal-sized folk.

Jan Jansen came through the last, and the portal collapsed behind him.

For a few moments the party stood on the hill overlooking a war.

"Now, now," Jan said to his dazed companions, "There is no need to make your impression of Uncle Scratchy when he pulled out of his vegetable row that turnip with Aunts' Petuania's wedding ring right in the middle of it. Coran, laddie, you go down there and find us a way to sneak in and kill Yaga-Shura."

"I recall that you, Jan, were once employed by Lanny as a burglar," Coran replied lazily. 

"'Tis true, but I have just opened the portal with my amazing magic, which if I may point out is a tougher feat than opening Niece Burrow's cellar doors. And this is not easy, mind you. Why, three strongmen once spend a fortnight trying to get through, only to discover that they should have been pulling, not pushing, and that behind those doors were solid dirt good for nothing but getting worms. You see, Niece Burrow, she had at least twenty faux cellars, and some say that she never head a real one." 

"Coran," Lady Irlana said sternly, "Even you can't be so superficial as to fail to notice that my dear cousin is incapable of stealth."

They all stared at Jan Jansen the Never Silent, resplendid in his adventurer's wear and his mouth hanging half-opened. Upon completing the full survey, Coran shrugged one shoulder and dropped his backpack and silk purple-and-green cape on the ground.

"I take it, he agrees with you for once…" Cyrando commented in wonder, watching Coran kneel and go meticulously through his belongings. He set aside a dagger in a plain sheath, a coil of thin rope, a garrote, a dark bandana and a tacky, golden spiral weighted by an emerald almost the size of Jan's nose. That last Coran used to hold his hair together at the nape of his neck. 

Under his dastardly cloak, all Coran's clothes were of supple dark-grey suede - the hooded tunic, the tights and the knee-high boots. The elf thrust the dagger through his belt, stuffed the rest of the gear into mysterious pockets, tied the bandana around his face, and lifted the cowl.

"There is surely enough suede about our dear Coran…" Lady Irlana muttered under her breath. Yet, the person who looked at her out of Coran's green eyes was someone else entirely. This stranger let her barb fly past him, and slipped down the hill, heading for the camp below. Or at least so they concluded, because the rogue had disappeared from sight the moment he had stepped into the dappled shadow of pussy-willows, circling the top of the hill.

They settled quietly, as if their silence helped Coran, any and watched the fireballs fly over the city's walls.

"Well," Lady Irlana said, when the silence grew thicker than cream and fireballs became as mundane a sight for them as the sparks of a campfire might be for another war-party, "perhaps you will shorten our waiting hours with some music, Garrick?"

Garrick paled: "My… my lady… Is it proper? People… they er… they die over there." He waved vaguely, and not precisely in the right direction, but since that was how Garrick did all things, they knew he was talking about Saradush. 

"And the four of us cannot do much but watch," Cyrando replied, "until Coran returns."

"If he returns," Lady Irlana echoed, and seeing Garrick's indignant stare, softened her voice: "We must place out trust in Coran, even if it sounds like a contradiction in terms. Play on, Garrick."

"I can help with the words," Cyrando offered helpfully, "if you'd chance to forget any."

Without another word, Garrick picked up his lute. One by one he played the songs of another places, another heroes, and another wars. The dread and courage were the same.

Out of the corner of his ear, Coran could hear Garrick singing. It rankled some, but he had no time for pouting. He had taken a good look at the camp even before he started his descent, and immediately decided which tent was Yaga-Shura's.

Fire giants where simple creatures, like all monsters created so freakishly strong that the need for intelligence never arose. Hence, the biggest tent was like to identify the leader. It stood in the middle of the camp too, golden and round, like some over-ambitious egg yolk. The circus tent in Athkatla's Promenade could have fit inside and there would be room for the menagerie. Where the circus was build from crudely painted canvas, Yaga-Shura's field abode was the heavy silks. Even with the sun still high in the sky, the monstrous pavilion gave enough shade to hide a regiment of Flaming Fists or near enough. 

Coran slipped past the sentries - he could have gone between their legs, he thought, but did not dare, not to mention the less than appealing view- and rolled under generous folds of the tent's side. There, covered by the smooth, cool silk he pulled his dagger out and set to carving a second entrance into the edifice. The fabric parted silently, and he watched the insides before weaseling his way in and crouching behind a chest.

As it happened, Yaga-Shura was holding a war counsel. Maybe it was luck, maybe it was fate, or maybe it was because he held them at noon every day, because it was easy time for giants to identify. "When it's light outside, but you can't see the sun," the orders went. Coran counted five giants standing around a burly fellow, with a leonine mane, wearing an eye-blindingly bright plate of red gold, who cold be none but Yaga-Shura.

The giants grunted and talked about supplies, and pitch, and a tunnel. Coran committed everything he'd heard to memory, hoping that his comrades would be able to identify anything that would help them to devise a plan to slay the red-topped mountain of flesh. It was not till he spoke, that Coran noted a sole non-giant being in the tent except for himself.

"You have all time in the world, Yaga-Shura," said the man in response to Yaga-Shura's frustrated orders to do more, to do faster, to burn the city to ashes if they have to. The man -a human of undeterminable age- was uncomfortably looking directly at Coran, as he spoke, though Coran was confident that he was out of sight. Apart from that peculiarity the speaker also seemed to hover above a bamboo mat. No, he was not hovering, but no less astonishingly, he was holding his entire weight up on a palm of the hand, thrust through the opening offered by his cress-crossed legs. He looked like some peculiar flower that way, though nowhere near pretty: ascetically thin, dark feverish eyes looking out of deep sockets and strange pattern imprinted on his forehead and cheeks.

"I rot here, breaking my men on this useless pile of stone, when my siblings hoard their armies!" Yaga-Shura growled, and slapped a table covered with maps for punctuation.

"None of them is immortal, though," the monk pointed out.

"The dragon and the drow are… or near enough," Yaga-Shura grunted.

"They still can be killed. Not you, my lord. None of them has their heart on fire, and kept out of harm's way by a crone in the Forest of Myr." Disconcertingly, the monk's eyes bore right through Coran again as he spoke. "Mighty Yaga-Shura has nothing to fear, till his heart burns in the ever-fire!"

Yaga-Shura slapped his chest for punctuation. The monk sweated a bit and lifted four fingers off the floor. He was now holding himself up on his thumb.

Coran needed no more hints and lingered only long enough to pilfer a tiny figurine of a griffin for Jan, a sweet pastry for Garrick and one blood-red rose for Irlana.

Upon his return to the camp on the hilltop, Coran found the company in subdued moods, and Garrick weeping. His own songs did it to him sometimes.


	3. Chapter 3

3.

"No," Jan shook his head, fingering the golden griffin, "No, I will not be able to open a second portal before we have rested."

"Then let's march," Lady Irlana said, pacing restlessly, "let's bloody march!"

"But I think…" Jan continued unperturbed and placed the figurine on the ground, "I think, that Coran found us the transport. This is no simple figurine, 'tis one of them that summon creatures from the other planes to do the summoner's bidding."

"I'd rather -" Lady Irlana started, but Cyrando pulled on the fold of her cloak, and when she leaned over to him, whispered something into her ear. She plucked the rose's petals off one by one as she listened, nodding.

"Alright," she said finally, "I give my consent. But only because it's not Jan's own magic. And if someone else has it in her safekeeping. " 

"Why, that leaves only you," Coran said sourly, "unless one of us is a woman in disguise?"

"Quite likely, considering that sometimes I'd rather hide my natural form than endure your attentions," Lady Irlana snapped and looked around her, as if truly believing that one of the men was a maiden in breeches. Cyrando grinned, and Garrick shook his head, licking the crumbs off his fingers.

Jan's eyes went misty with memory: "It reminds me that time that Edwin, the Red Wizard of Thay talked Lanny into recovering a rare scroll of Netheril. The next night we had the same number of companions, but Edwin's robes filled out much more satisfactory around the chest area…"

"Jan, stop talking nonsense, and tell me how do I make us the griffin from this?" Lady Irlana pointed at the bronze statuette.

Garrick looked at the figurine, no bigger than his palm and asked cautiously: "Are you… er…serious? Can that thing fly?"

"Yes," Coran said, "since it is a female griffin."

Lady Irlana issued forth an exasperated sigh.

"What did I say?" Coran complained, "It's the common knowledge that only female griffins have wings!" 

Throwing suspicious glances Coran's way, and following Jan's instructions, Lady Irlana stood in front of the figurine, her hands extended towards it and her face focused. In a few minutes sweat rolled down the Lady's face, and thin mist billowed around the bronze griffin. The wisps curled higher and higher, up in the air, and the mist grew thicker… Then Lady Irlana stumbled and fell to the ground. With a desperate cry, Cyrando leaped forward, but Jan caught him.

"She will be fine. 'Tis just like that time that -"

Cyrando cringed: "Was not one of Jansens killed by griffins?"

"Aye," Jan answered readily, "but I meant to tell quite a different story."

There was no need. Lady Irlana shifted on the ground and sat up groggily. A majestic winged figure, with the body of a lion, the eagle's head and wings, and the thick paws ending in the claws of a bird of prey stepped out of the fog.

"Command…" Jan whispered.

Lady Irlana looked at the griffin, and at the men, and said softly: "It is not as large as to carry more than two. Cyrando, Jan, I will take you across, and then one of you will return to bring Coran and Garrick. It will be cumbersome, but at least it will be safe." 

Then, without waiting on any arguments, Lady Irlana mounted the griffin as casually as she would a warhorse. Jan and Cyrando, aided by Coran and Garrick scrambled to settle on the beast's massive ramp. The griffon jumped up in the air, flapping her great wings and made a few circles above the hilltop before disappearing from sight of a human and an elf left behind.

Coran picked up the torn rose, sniffed at what was left of it and sighed: "A waste of a beautiful thing."

"Why do you… er… persist?" Garrick asked, "do you still hope to win her love back?"

"No," Coran said lightly, "I don't like rekindling the old flames. They burn more than they warm you up."

Garrick stared at him blankly.

"My weapon master, dear Garrick, taught me to always keep my weapons sharp, no matter how unlikely a battle is. An excellent practice, that. Why not apply it in courting as well? A useful exercise, even if I don't stand a chance to win Lady Irlana."

"Oh," Garrick replied, "Oh…" And then he added, blushing: "Do you think that I… er… stand a chance?" 

"No," Coran said confidently, "No."

Garrick wished that the griffin's flight lasted indefinitely, despite the saddle sores and cold air assaulting his nose and throat. Every time the griffon's wings rose to the highest point, their mount fell for a dizzying heartbeat, and then soared right back up. He was lucky to have a strong stomach, stronger than anyone in the company it seemed, as divine Irlana had surrendered her driver's duties to Jan after the first flight.

She was somewhere to the east and far below him now, the fairest lady and her lord and husband, setting the camp in the dark forest of Mir. He peered over the griffin's ramp at the endless tide of trees, dark and untamed against the islands of light-green fields the size of a handkerchief.

Garrick did not have one of those handy accessories, so he settled for wiping his running nose on his sleeve, but even this inconvenience did not ruin his mood. He wanted to sing to the sky, to the sun and to the land below him, but he did not dare. Griffins were finicky magic animals, and a prosaic horse once threw him off when he tried a very uplifting battle song on a ride with Lord Axilum, his former benefactor. He still blushed remembering his humiliation and the coarse jokes of the Lord's retainers.

This was a thousand times better than any horse gallop. He could fly… he could fly… he could - Garrick's heart jumped into his throat as the griffin started a downward spiral towards a cone of smoke rising off the ground. Towards fair Irlana. 

Garrick rolled off the griffin and eyed Jan in surprise as the gnome catapulted out of his own saddle. "Aren't you… aren't you going to return for Coran?"

"Who?" asked Cyrando and Lady Irlana arched a golden brow questioningly.

"Co-coran," Garrick said unsteadily, "the… the thief?"

The couple exchanged looks. "No, I can't recall anyone by that name. A thief? Perhaps you meant our dear cousin Jan?"

"No, no…" Garrick mumbled in fear that the party would leave the elf on the hill overlooking the burning Saradush. "The elf. I am talking about the elf…."

"Now," Jan started cheerfully, "that reminds me of the trial and tribulations of my nephew, Anisar, who'd thought that his beloved had lost her virginity to a trickster named Volo, but it turned out that she had only lost her maidenhood, but kept her virginity. It's quite a story how he found out, but my point is that the things aren't what they seem more often than not. Those high-cantered saddles could be a death to maidenhoods.

And I was just stretching my poor legs. Why, that brings to mind my kinsman's adopted daughter, Aerie… "

Unable to follow the story, Garrick turned back to Irlana and Cyrando, and found the couple struggling with the suppressed laughter.

"Of course," he thought, "She is a paladin, and she would not let her companion down."

But the prank made him sulky, and he ate the stew that Cyrando cooked in silence, wishing… wishing that Cyrando were not kissing Irlana quite so often. Even Coran's eventual and flashy arrival did not dispel his sourness.

So it happened that Garrick, the Bard, was hanging back, exploring the completely new for him yearning for solitude, when the party stepped under the ill-famed boughs of the Forest of Mir. He did not even participate in the whispered, yet hot debate on how to find one witch in a huge wooded area.

A yelp from Coran attracted his attention though. He hardly even recognized the elf's voice, for the rogue had abandoned the usual caressing undertones for a yelp of a boy.

"Mother!" Coran exclaimed helplessly extending his hands towards someone unseen, "mother! I am sorry…"

At the same time, Lady Irlana went to her knees, writhing her hands: "Sir, I… I am glad that I can beg for your forgiveness. I had left you to die at the orc's hands, I had to… I did not have enough men left to break you free, and I could not, I could not - " 

"Oh, Lyssa!" Jan was bubbling, "I though 'twas going to be all right, oh, Lyssa…"

Cyrando was crying large bulbous tears and saying nothing.

Garrick looked at the strange cameo, and touched Irlana by the shoulder:

"Lady, what is thy trouble?"

But the paladin did not react, weeping and doing strange gestures, clapping the air right above her head between her palms:

"Oh, dear, my dear, I could not… and there was your command to leave, if you did not return within an hour, no matter what -"

"She is trying to catch someone invisible by the hand…" Garrick realized suddenly, "they all are talking to ghosts! By Deneir, what do I do?!"

And he _had _to do something, since his companions were becoming more and more engrossed in their tears and self-loathing. Hesitantly, he pulled his rapier out.

"Maybe it can't stand against a steel plate, but surely, a ghost…"

And he stabbed at whoever it was whose knees Irlana was hugging.

For a moment, a young knight with sad, pale face and the eyes like sun, appeared from thin air. His armor was stained with red blood, but he oozed green out of the wound inflicted by Garrick's iron. The knight turned to him, hissing. His perfect features twisted into a feral snarl, and became altogether inhuman. Long, bony arms reached for his throat, and Garrick could do nothing but drop to the ground, by Irlana. Shaken, the paladin came to her feet. She swung her sword at Garrick, and he rolled, or rather squirmed away like a worm. The sword point plowed the dirt by his ear, filling the air with the scent of the pine needles. She swung again.

"Irlana! A ghost…. Only a ghost…" Garrick whispered, raising his rapier somehow…. Irlana whirled away, dealing a solid blow to the creature that was not a knight.

A stern, exasperated elven matron; a wide-eyed gnomish girl; and a maiden seemingly weaved from the starlight were revealed as the tormentors of the other companions. They fought stubbornly, sometimes screaming madly, and sometimes whispering the words that lost their hold on the companions.

As the last shadow fell to the ground, someone applauded and laughed: a dry, cackling sound.

"I think… I think, we have er… found our crone," Garrick said unsteadily.

Indeed, leaning on a red staff, there stood a bent, small woman, her face a myriad of folds and purple spots of advanced age; her eyes colorless, but sharp; and her mouth toothless.

"You found me," she confirmed, "and you have killed my guardians. You would kill my son too, won't you?"

"Your er… son?" Garrick asked. It was difficult to imagine any Fire Giant reduced to such a tiny remnant.

The crone crooked her finger at him. "Come here, you seem to be the only one with your wits left of the lot."

It was impossible to disobey. Garrick moved forward as if in a dream, and endured to bend some and be leaned upon by the flabby witch. Her jaw was shaking as she spoke:

"My son, Yaga-Shura. Oh, I have not given him birth, no. But I weaned him, and raised him, and I set his heart on fire."

"M-making him invincible?" Coran managed.

"Yes, invincible," the crone said. "Also, it burns away what a man or woman had loved in the past, and, by obvious reasons, precludes them from ever loving again…."

She paused and shrugged. "I did the same for myself. But it is time for both of us to die. So, my pretty children, I am going to tell you where Yaga-Shura's and mine hearts are. You will go there, and you will take them and bring both hearts back to me."

They all leaned forward then, straining their necks, afraid to miss a word. 

"There is a temple in the middle of the mountain of fire, and there is an altar in the middle of it. The rivers of molten rock flow around it, and the hundred and one Fire Giant stand guard, day and night. Go and -"

"A hundred and one Fire Giant! Then we are lost!" Irlana exclaimed. "This is impossible!"

Cyrando took her by the hand, and squeezed: "If we have to die… at least we shall die together, my love."

Irlana looked down at him, into his eyes and her lips opened in a small smile -

"Stop it."

Garrick tried to straighten, but failed in the witch's grasp.

"I… I think I have a… er… a plan."

"Yes?" They all asked in unison.

"Well," Garrick said hurriedly, "Well, if the crone could set two hearts on fire, she could set the third! And then… and then… we would have an invincible champion… Er… me."

"No," Coran said, "no, lad, don't you even think of that. Your heart is your own, and you cannot sacrifice it for any war… or any woman."

"Garrick, please…" Lady Irlana pleaded, and even Cyrando looked abashed.

Jan, the Never Silent said not a word, and that was the worst sign of all. 

"Listen to me," Garrick said more firmly, "Why was it that all of you had seen the er... beloved ghosts back there, and I did not? It's because I have never loved, really, never cared… er… deeply enough for no one. Not even for…" his eyes moved to Irlana quickly, and he sighed.

"So… so you see, it could do no wrong to set mine heart on fire. We will have a champion, and later, the crone will just extinguish my heart, and I will be back to normal. Right?"

"Well, theoretically… yes," the crone said chewing on her lower lip with her pink gums.

"No," said Irlana. "No," echoed Coran. "No," said Cyrando, and pushed Jan, who closed his mouth shut with a snap, coughed and repeated: "No."

"I… I am sorry," Garrick replied, "But that is er… my heart. Of sorts. And… and I want to. It's our only chance!"

The crone nodded after his ever word, and suddenly, Coran, and Jan, and Lady Irlana, and Cyrando were pushed off their feet and blown back a hundred paces by a wave of air. 

When they scrambled back up only a heartbeat later, hefting their weapons, it was full night in the ill-famed Forest of Mir. 

Garrick stood by the crone holding an earthenware jar with a long loop of a handle. He lifted it up with a triumphant cry for them to see. The contents -Garrick's heart - were on fire, sending the bright sparks into the darkness. The red and gold dapples of the reflected light danced across Garrick's face. There was a firmer set to his mouth, and his eyes looked like coals.

"Are you pitying me?" Garrick asked incredulously of his stunned companions, "I am invincible, fools!"


End file.
